Santo gets long-belated love from Cooperstown

Ted S. Warren/AP FileFormer Chicago Cubs third baseman and broadcaster, Ron Santo, considered by many one of the best to play the game at his position, will be posthumously inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame today. Santo, shown here throwing out the ceremonial first pitch in 2002 at Wrigley Field, died in 2010.

Ron Santo and Barry Larkin join the pantheon of immortals this afternoon in Cooperstown, N.Y., bringing the total in the Hall of Fame to 299.

We have long championed Santo’s cause for the Hall, and it remains one of the great mysteries of the institution that he wasn’t inducted sooner. He was finally recognized by the Veterans Committee, 38 years after his retirement and a year after his death.

What took so long?

It’s not like he was underappreciated as a player. He played on nine All-Star teams, won five Gold Gloves, and finished in the top 10 of National League MVP voting four times.
Santo hit 342 career homers, and from 1964-67 hit 30 or more homers each year.

That’s a pretty impressive feat during a pitcher’s era. He had four 100-RBI seasons and in the eight-year period from 1963-70 never drove in fewer than 94. In addition, Santo led the NL in walks four times and on-base percentage twice.

At the time of his retirement in 1974, the case could be made that Santo was the third-best third baseman in baseball history behind Eddie Mathews and Brooks
Robinson. Even by the time he first became eligible for the Hall in 1980, not much had really changed. Mike Schmidt and George Brett were on the rise, but neither had yet won his first MVP award. Wade Boggs, another future all-time great, was still in the minors.

Yet Santo never received the love from the baseball writers. His highest percentage of votes during his 15 years on the ballot was 43.1 percent, far short of the 75-percent minimum needed for election to the Hall.

If the WAR (Wins Above Replacement) metric were around 30-odd years ago, it’s doubtful Santo would have had to wait past his first year of eligibility. The value of WAR is that it is an easy way to compare players from different eras and it is certainly a valid measurement. After all, the most valuable player in the history of baseball according to WAR is Babe Ruth, far and away. Who can argue with that? And who could argue with the top 10 of the Babe (178.3), Cy Young (160.8), Barry Bonds (158.1), Walter Johnson (157.8), Willie Mays (150.8), Ty Cobb (145.0), Hank Aaron (137.3), Roger Clemens (133.9), Tris Speaker (127.7) and Honus Wagner (126.1)?

MIND GAMES: You don’t think of a Hall of Famer having the same doubts about his ability as the rest of us mere mortals have, but Larkin admitted to those very same fears recently on mlb.com while referencing his early days in the big leagues.

“I remember asking myself and asking people around me, ‘Am I cut out to do this?’ ‘Am I good enough?’ ” Larkin said. “There’s a lot of self-doubt, a lot of questions.”

Compounding that pressure was the fact that not only was Larkin from Cincinnati but was competing with another young shortstop for playing time. Kurt Stillwell was another pretty good prospect and had the advantage of being a personal favorite of Reds owner Marge Schott.

“I remember as a rookie,” Larkin said, “looking at my jersey when I was in the infield and looking at the name ‘Cincinnati’ and understanding, ‘Wow, I’m representing a city, my hometown.’

“That all goes into the self-doubt. ‘Can I do this? I have responsibilities. Can I handle those responsibilities?’ ”

Larkin played just 41 games in his rookie season of 1986, hitting .283, but by the next season became the Reds’ primary shortstop, playing in 125 games although he hit just .244. He raised his average to .296 in 1988, then hit .300 or better in nine of the next 12 seasons.

Larkin had a career batting line of .295/.371/.444 (batting average/on-base percentage/slugging percentage), appeared in 12 All-Star games, won three Gold Gloves and was the National League MVP in 1995. But he still remembers those early days filled with dread.

“I was living a dream,” he said, “and you’re thinking so much and you want to be so good. And those are all things encompassed in that self-doubt.

“When you go out there and get two or three years under your belt, when you go out there and have a track record, you’re like, ‘Whew.’ But that’s not the case when you first get into it. And I don’t care what anybody says.”

2013 BALLOT: Much will be written about next year’s potential class — and we’ll be among the many doing the writing as the ballots are due in January — but it is going to be a controversial dilemma for the voting contingent.

Among the first-year eligibles are Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Sammy Sosa, all of whom have been tainted by the stigma of performance-enhancing drugs. Also on the ballot are Mike Piazza, the most prolific offensive catcher in history, and Craig Biggio, a member of the 3,000-hit club.